Marriage Cross
Canvas: 20” x 30”
Time: 3 hours
Cost: $1,100
Date: June 3rd, 2018
Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. . —Ephesians 5:21
...and the two become one flesh. . —Genesis 2:24
This Sunday morning, I have several ideas to capture the concept of the mystery of the union between a woman and a man, but I am not sure how to pull them together. Dancers, a pillar of fire, and Christ embracing them. This painting unfolds as I focus on the concept that Doug wanted to convey most: sacrifice. I clearly see Christ in the center, being the model of sacrifice. But, I am not sure how to symbolize the man and woman giving up their lives to each other. At first, I imagine the woman with a fruit basket, and the man with a sword—each surrendering them at the foot of the cross. However, this composition becomes too awkward. So, I adjust their posture, extend their arms further forward to minister to Jesus’ wounded foot, and position Christ kneeling over them as a kind of shelter. My intention is to create a single figure in the sky to reflect two becoming one. (But, like God, I realize just one was “not good.”) I change my mind and instead, from the side of the male figure, I begin to draw out the female figure. Just at that moment, Doug refers back to the Genesis story of Creation with God taking Eve out of Adam’s side!
Later, with the figures floating above I see a way to connect them with smoke rising up from the earthbound couples’ interlocking hands. Now, Christ becomes mysteriously intermingled in that very smoke as Doug says emphatically that it is out of reverence for CHRIST that man and woman submit one to another.